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With characters situated in surreal, Twilight Zone-esque, yet all-too-familiar positions of oppression within our most venerable institutions, Nana Kwame Adjei-Brenyah's 2018 debut fiction collection, Friday Black, was praised as a "vivid, original'' portrait of ''America in all its racism, weirdness and abject consumerism'' (People). The winner of the PEN/Jean Stein Book Award and the Saroyan Prize and a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle's John Leonard Award for Best First Book, Adjei-Brenyah has contributed work to some of the country's most prestigious publications, including Guernica, Esquire, The New York Times Book Review, and The Paris Review. In Chain Gang All-Stars, his debut novel, he follows the gladiatorial fortunes of two women inmates who compete for their freedom in highly profitable and popular officially sanctioned prison death matches. Praised by George Saunders as ''a prodigiously talented writer, with a huge heart,'' Daniel Torday won the National Jewish Book Award for both his debut novel The Sensualist and his follow-up, The Last Flight of Poxl West. His other work includes the novel Boomer1 as well as articles and essays published in Esquire, n+1, Tin House, and The New York Times, among other publications. A professor of creative writing at Bryn Mawr College, Torday is also the winner of the Sami Rohr Choice Prize. The 12th Commandment delves into the sins, redemptions, and secrets of an Ohio-based Jewish-Islamic religious sect grappling with the murder of its prophet's son. (recorded 5/8/2023)
Join us for a reading by Lori Jakiela, who won the 2021 Wicked Woman Poetry Prize for her manuscript, How Do You Like It Now, Gentlemen?, and the contest judge, Nancy Naomi Carlson. Lori Jakiela is the author of the memoir Belief Is Its Own Kind of Truth, Maybe (2016), which received the 2016 Saroyan Prize from Stanford University. She is also the author of the memoirs Miss New York Has Everything, The Bridge to Take When Things Get Serious, and Portrait of the Artist as a Bingo Worker, as well as the poetry collections Spot the Terrorist! and How Do You Like It Now, Gentlemen? Her work has been published in The New York Times, The Washington Post, The Chicago Tribune, The Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, and more. Recently, actress Kristen Bell chose Jakiela's New York Times' Modern Love essay, "The Plain Unmarked Box Arrived," to perform on the Times' Modern Love podcast. Jakiela writes a monthly column, Stories of Our Neighbors, for Pittsburgh Magazine and directs the undergraduate Creative and Professional Writing Program at The University of Pittsburgh's Greensburg campus. She lives in her hometown of Trafford, PA, with her husband, the author Dave Newman, and their children. For more, visit her author website at http://lorijakiela.net. Nancy Naomi Carlson, twice an NEA literature translation grant recipient, has published eleven titles (seven translated). An Infusion of Violets (Seagull, 2019) was called “new & noteworthy” by The New York Times. An associate editor for Tupelo Press, her work has appeared in such journals as The American Poetry Review, The Georgia Review, The Paris Review, and Poetry. Learn more at www.nancynaomicarlson.com. Doritt Carroll, BrickHouse Books Poetry Editor, and Clarinda Harriss, BrickHouse Books Director and Editor-in-Chief, hosts this event. Read "Former 90s Supermodel Cindy Crawford Says People Shouldn't Worry About Aging" by Lori Jakiela. Read "Sequoia" by Nancy Naomi Carlson. Learn more about the Wicked Woman Poetry Prize. Recorded On: Thursday, October 14, 2021
In conversation with Nomi Eve, author of Henna House and The Family Orchard, Director of the Creative Writing MFA program, Drexel University. ''One of America's most important novelists and an international literary sensation'' (New York Times), Nicole Krauss is the bestselling author of the celebrated books Man Walks into a Room, The History of Love, Great House, and Forest Dark. She is the inaugural writer-in-residence at Columbia University's Mind, Brain, and Behavior Institute, and her other work has appeared in Harper's, Esquire, and the New Yorker. Krauss is the winner of the Saroyan Prize for International Literature and a finalist for the National Book Award, among many other honors. To Be a Man is a globe-hopping story collection that delves into the very nature of what drives men and women in their relationships. (recorded 11/10/2020)
Tom's next guest is the acclaimed author Nicole Krauss. She is the author of four novels, including the international bestsellers Forest Dark, Great House, The History of Love, and her debut novel, Man Walks Into a Room. She’s been a finalist for the National Book Award and the Orange Prize, and she a winner of the Saroyan Prize and the Prix du Meilleur Livre Étranger in France. Last week, on Election Day as it turns out, Harper Collins published Krauss's first collection of short stories. It’s called To Be a Man: Stories. In it, we are introduced to a dazzling array of characters in locales that span the globe from Israel, to Japan, Switzerland, and both coasts of the United States. Nicole Krauss is doing a number of virtual events in which she’ll talk about her new short-story collection. Tonight, she’ll be online with the Free Library of Philadelphia at 7:30. Tomorrow, the Harvard Bookstore in Cambridge, Massachusetts, will host an event at 7:00. And she’ll be at an event sponsored by the American Jewish University in Los Angeles, California, next Wednesday afternoon at 3:00. [Ticketing fees for the online events cover the purchase of Ms. Krauss's new book.] Nicole Krauss joins Tom on Zoom…
A decrepit house in Greendale, Mississippi once belonged to Billie James’s father, a renowned black poet who died unexpectedly when she was four years old. Her mother dies of cancer. Then years later, her paternal grandmother dies and leaves Billie the old Mississippi Delta house. At age 34, Billie returns to the house, encounters the locals, and learns that on the day her father died, she went missing. She doesn’t want to leave Mississippi until she finds out what happened, but someone doesn’t want Billie to know the truth. Told from several perspectives, The Gone Dead (Ecco, 2019) is a story about family and memory, justice for those who were never given a chance, and some of the wounds caused by racism in America. Chanelle Benz has published work in Guernica, Granta.com, The New York Times, Electric Literature, The American Reader, Fence and others, and is the recipient of an O. Henry Prize. Her story collection The Man Who Shot Out My Eye Is Dead was named a Best Book of 2017 by The San Francisco Chronicle and one of Electric Literature’s 15 Best Short Story Collections of 2017. It was also shortlisted for the 2018 Saroyan Prize and longlisted for the 2018 PEN/Robert Bingham Prize for Debut Fiction and the 2017 Story Prize. The Gone Dead was a New York Times Book Review Editor’s Choice and a Tonight Show Summer Reads Finalist. It was long-listed for the 2020 PEN/Hemingway Award for Debut Novel and the 2019 Center for Fiction First Novel Prize. It was also named a best new book of the summer by O, The Oprah Magazine, Time, Southern Living, and Nylon. Benz currently lives in Memphis where she teaches at Rhodes College. Whenever possible, she loves to listen to true crime and history podcasts. If you enjoyed today’s podcast and would like to discuss it further with me and other New Books network listeners, please join us on Shuffle. Shuffle is an ad-free, invite-only network focused on the creativity community. As NBN listeners, you can get special access to conversations with a dynamic community of writers and literary enthusiasts. Sign up by going to www.shuffle.do/NBN/join G.P. Gottlieb is the author of the Whipped and Sipped Mystery Series and a prolific baker of healthful breads and pastries. Please contact her through her website (GPGottlieb.com) if you wish to recommend an author (of a beautifully-written new novel) to interview, to listen to her previous podcast interviews, to read her mystery book reviews, or to check out some of her awesome recipes. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
A decrepit house in Greendale, Mississippi once belonged to Billie James’s father, a renowned black poet who died unexpectedly when she was four years old. Her mother dies of cancer. Then years later, her paternal grandmother dies and leaves Billie the old Mississippi Delta house. At age 34, Billie returns to the house, encounters the locals, and learns that on the day her father died, she went missing. She doesn’t want to leave Mississippi until she finds out what happened, but someone doesn’t want Billie to know the truth. Told from several perspectives, The Gone Dead (Ecco, 2019) is a story about family and memory, justice for those who were never given a chance, and some of the wounds caused by racism in America. Chanelle Benz has published work in Guernica, Granta.com, The New York Times, Electric Literature, The American Reader, Fence and others, and is the recipient of an O. Henry Prize. Her story collection The Man Who Shot Out My Eye Is Dead was named a Best Book of 2017 by The San Francisco Chronicle and one of Electric Literature’s 15 Best Short Story Collections of 2017. It was also shortlisted for the 2018 Saroyan Prize and longlisted for the 2018 PEN/Robert Bingham Prize for Debut Fiction and the 2017 Story Prize. The Gone Dead was a New York Times Book Review Editor’s Choice and a Tonight Show Summer Reads Finalist. It was long-listed for the 2020 PEN/Hemingway Award for Debut Novel and the 2019 Center for Fiction First Novel Prize. It was also named a best new book of the summer by O, The Oprah Magazine, Time, Southern Living, and Nylon. Benz currently lives in Memphis where she teaches at Rhodes College. Whenever possible, she loves to listen to true crime and history podcasts. If you enjoyed today’s podcast and would like to discuss it further with me and other New Books network listeners, please join us on Shuffle. Shuffle is an ad-free, invite-only network focused on the creativity community. As NBN listeners, you can get special access to conversations with a dynamic community of writers and literary enthusiasts. Sign up by going to www.shuffle.do/NBN/join G.P. Gottlieb is the author of the Whipped and Sipped Mystery Series and a prolific baker of healthful breads and pastries. Please contact her through her website (GPGottlieb.com) if you wish to recommend an author (of a beautifully-written new novel) to interview, to listen to her previous podcast interviews, to read her mystery book reviews, or to check out some of her awesome recipes. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
MFA Fiction Candidates Peter Williams and Zeke Perkins interview Chanelle Benz during her visit to UKY. Chanelle Benz has published work in Guernica, Granta.com, The New York Times, Electric Literature, The American Reader, Fence and others, and is the recipient of an O. Henry Prize. Her story collection The Man Who Shot Out My Eye Is Dead was published in 2017 by Ecco/HarperCollins. It was named a Best Book of 2017 by The San Francisco Chronicle and one of Electric Literature’s 15 Best Short Story Collections of 2017. It was also shortlisted for the 2018 Saroyan Prize and longlisted for the 2018 PEN/Robert Bingham Prize for Debut Fiction and the 2017 Story Prize. Her novel The Gone Dead was published by Ecco/HarperCollins in June 2019 and was a New York Times Book Review Editor’s Choice and a Tonight Show Summer Reads Finalist. It was named a best new book of the summer by O, The Oprah Magazine, Time, Southern Living, and Nylon. She currently lives in Memphis where she teaches at Rhodes College.
Watch the video here. A ''fiction pioneer, toying with fresh ways of rendering experience and emotion'' (NPR), Nicole Krauss is the bestselling author of the acclaimed novels Man Walks into a Room, The History of Love, and Great House. Named one of Granta's Best Young American Novelists and The New Yorker's ''20 Under 40,'' she is the winner of the Saroyan Prize for International Literature and a finalist for the National Book Award, among many other honors. In Forest Dark, Krauss interweaves the disparate paths of an older lawyer and a young novelist searching for transcendence in an Israeli desert. Nathan Englander is the author of the story collections For the Relief of Unbearable Urges and What We Talk About When We Talk About Anne Frank, a Pulitzer Prize finalist and winner of the Frank O'Connor International Short Story Award. In addition to his widely anthologized short fiction, he is the author of the novel The Ministry of Special Cases, a play titled The Twenty-Seventh Man, and works that have appeared in The New Yorker and The Washington Post, among other places. In his new novel, Englander illustrates the Israeli–Palestinian conflict via a political thriller that hinges on the complicated relationship between a guard and his secret prisoner. (recorded 9/14/2017)
Nicole Krauss has been hailed by the New York Times as 'one of America's most important novelists'. She is the author of the international bestsellers, Great House, which was a finalist for the National Book Award and the Orange Prize, and The History of Love, which won the Saroyan Prize for International Literature and France's Prix du Meilleur Livre Étranger, and was short-listed for the Orange, Médicis, and Femina prizes. Her first novel, Man Walks Into a Room, was a finalist for the Los Angeles Times Book of the Year. In 2007, she was selected as one of Granta's Best Young American Novelists, and in 2010 she was chosen by the New Yorker for their 'Twenty Under Forty' list. Her fiction has been published in the New Yorker, Harper's, Esquire, and Best American Short Stories, and her books have been translated into more than thirty-five languages. Her latest novel is Forest Dark. Kamila Shamsie is the author of six previous novels: In the City by the Sea; Kartography (both shortlisted for the John Llewellyn Rhys Prize); Salt and Saffron; Broken Verses; Burnt Shadows (shortlisted for the Orange Prize for Fiction) and A God in Every Stone, which was shortlisted for the Baileys Prize, the Walter Scott Prize for Historical Fiction and the DSC Prize for South Asian Literature. Three of her novels have received awards from Pakistan's Academy of Letters. Kamila Shamsie is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature and in 2013 was named a Granta Best of Young British Novelist. Her latest novel, Home Fire has been longlisted for the 2017 Man Booker Prize. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.
Through Tinted Lenses? How Chinese and Americans See Each Other (Audio Only)
Sheila Melvin is a regular contributor to the International Herald Tribune and Caixin, though her work has appeared in many other publications. She writes principally on the arts in China. Her books include Rhapsody in Red: How Western Classical Music Became Chinese, a co-authored work which was short-listed for the Saroyan Prize in 2005 and The Little Red Book of China Business. Melvin is now working on a book that explores China's quest to become a cultural superpower.
Through Tinted Lenses? How Chinese and Americans See Each Other
Sheila Melvin is a regular contributor to the International Herald Tribune and Caixin, though her work has appeared in many other publications. She writes principally on the arts in China. Her books include Rhapsody in Red: How Western Classical Music Became Chinese, a co-authored work which was short-listed for the Saroyan Prize in 2005 and The Little Red Book of China Business. Melvin is now working on a book that explores China's quest to become a cultural superpower.